my habit of thinking

Tag Archives: road trips

I’ve been flashing backwards and drawing parallels between similar events that happened at different times and I’ve come to the conclusion (with my capitalist hat on) that starting things with proper footing will, for the most part, be the best way to map out a smooth course.

If you’re not one to want smooth courses in life then, well, you’re ridiculous because you can’t make your WHOLE life difficult for yourself can you? Maybe you can, but do you want to? I get exhausted and in the process exhaust my fellow bipeds when I’ve made things more difficult than I could have. I agree that sometimes difficulty is actually a blessing, especially on road trips where difficulty brings about unexpected adventure…. but there are somethings, for me, that will be adventure enough without reoccurring problems and bad behaviors stemming from not having started off with the correct footing.

The way I see it is that if part of my life starts off one way, in one set of circumstances then it might end a similar way when a new part of life starts. Happens all the time with hobbies. I was making a pair of pants once and they ended up not fitting properly so I never finished them, in my frustration over why I couldn’t get the pattern to fit right I started crocheting a scarf. So I used my new absorption in the new hobby as an excuse not to confront issues with the previous one.

Eventually I had 5 or 6 unfinished projects laying around that I had spent money on and every time I looked into the sewing room there they were calling out “FINISH ME, FINISH ME.” But when the going got difficult I put them aside in that dark room and used another project to give me something to look forward to. It was only way later that I actually sorted through all those unfinished high school projects and finished them. Now I’m free and can start a new project for the sake of getting it done instead of trying to distract me from where I screwed up in the past

Works the same with relationships…..say, for example, I make a new friend, but our friendship actually evolved because the other party was angry at their best friend. The activities that my new friend and I do began around him telling me the horrible side of his soon-to-be-former-friend.

I listen while my new friend tells the soon-to-be-former that he is doing their favorite activities with me instead and am relieved when his former friend declines the invitation to join us. I listen as my new friend hangs up the phone after saying bye in a seemingly friendly voice and says “Bitch, Ha!” Nonetheless he’s hanging out with me and we’re having a good time so what’s the harm? Their problems have nothing to do with me. Then time passes and that whole situation is practically forgotten in our minds… until… until… I notice the same behavior but this time I am on the other end… I am the soon to be former friend.

Had I not been dealing with the same objects in the respect to each other then this theory would fall apart. So I see it happen, I know how my friend treated his former best friend, I was there I saw what role I played and I can see who is playing the former Me. So in this case I would recommend, not starting a relationship of any kind with someone who uses you as backup to finish off another because in my experience it has too much potential to be a reoccurring behavioral response to certain conditions (if it worked before, why not again?) and you will either see it coming or wonder what point in your life you’ll be at when it does and who else it will effect.

Call it capitalist efficiency if you like, or call it peace of mind, or call it being able to finish what you start, or call it shaping your life into what you want it to be, or call it not being weak, or call it placing reliability on yourself instead of on other things or people…. anything except “just because.”